Princes

Third

"Thanks for driving me home, Mom."

"Oh, no problem, sweetie." Mom said with a bright smile. "I've been bored all day, it's nice to have something to do."

It's Mom's day off, Mother is still at work. Mother encouraged Mom to take a lot of off days, while Mother herself took virtually none.

I know, the mother/mom thing is confusing, you'll get used to it.

I felt four pinpricks of pain one my left leg when I stepped through the door, and jerked back, looking down at my pet ball-sack alien, whose claws had found their way into my leg.

Sorry, I mean hairless cat.

I scooped him up, and held him like a baby. He was my baby, him and Edison, at least.

"I still don't know what I was thinking when I let you pick that thing up off the street." Mom sighed, sitting on the sofa and cracking open her book. It seemed she got a decent way through it. I knelt down, making sure the cat didn't fall, to peek at the title. Dead as a Doornail by Charlaine Harris. Mom really loves those trashy vampire books, especially the True Blood series.

"Obviously you already knew what a delight he was." I smiled, rubbing his back until he was purring like a car engine.

"Yeah, I don't think that's the case."

I got him a couple years ago. It was my birthday, and we were on our way to the animal shelter to pick out one to adopt, and I found him sniffing at a discarded french fries carrier, deciding whether to eat it or not.

I almost broke the car window by how hard I slammed it with excitement. My moms practically laughed in my face when I pointed at him.

"Levi," Mother had said through laughter, "You are not getting some hideous stray cat."

I had gawked at her, "Mother, do you know how freaking expensive hairless cats are? Someone practically abandoned $800!"

My moms looked at each other, doing some weird thing where they spoke to each other without even speaking.

"You couldn't find an obnoxiously chubby stray cat in Wales!" I piped up, bringing up our home country was always a good idea when asking for something from my moms. "Especially one that costs over eight hundred dollars!"

"Levi..." Mom trailed off. Mom was typically the more sensitive one, the one I always asked first if I wanted something. She considered a few things before biting her lip.

"Well, I don't see why not..." Mom murmured to Mother, as if I couldn't hear her.

"Bethany..." Mother groaned, "It's probably got every kind flea or tick that exists!"

"I don't think hairless cats get fleas or ticks!" I piped up again.

"I'm pretty sure they do, Levi." Mother bit back, though her voice was dripped with questioning.

"C'mon, Aimee," Mom said. "Levi's right, hairless cats are expensive, and he really, really, seems to want it."

Mother's glare flicked from Mom to the hairless cat, his belly swollen with grub found on the street. After a while, she caved.

"Fine, get the damn cat, Levi."

I named him Pubert Montgomery Blackwell, Pube for short, and he's gotten fatter ever since. He's now three quarters of the size of a basketball, and is decorated with several chins.

He may be an obese ball-sack alien with temperamental issues, but he's my obese ball-sack alien with temperamental issues.

As my wimpy biceps strained against Pubert's weight, I walked into my room. I admired my poster of Andy Warhol's Liza Minelli print, poking her nose, whispering "Boop!", then briefly contemplating my sanity.